Journalist Marc Prosser is from Plymouth and Denmark, with a foot in both camps. Here he explores the global reaction to the culling of a baby giraffe in Copenhagen.

The decision of Copenhagen Zoo to put down an 18-month old giraffe named Marius, dissect it in front of zoo visitors, including children, and then feed it to the zoo’s lions recently became international news, causing public outcry - including in Britain, where at least parts of the media and population were outraged by the decision.

As part Danish and part English, I think the whole situation illustrates the differences between the two countries I call home, and perhaps the way that children are brought up differently in each.

To avoid rushing ahead of ourselves, let us start with the beginning: Marius the Giraffe was, not surprisingly, a giraffe. He lived in Copenhagen Zoo, but the zoo decided to put him down due to the fact that his genes were, for lack of a better word, redundant. Copenhagen Zoo is part of a pan-European breeding programme for giraffes in captivity that tries to keep the giraffe gene pool as diverse as possible. Sadly, Marius’ genes were judged to not be unique, and so the zoo decided to put him down. Several zoos, including an English one, offered to take Marius, but Copenhagen Zoo declined, citing that it would not help the gene pool of giraffes, and proceeded with killing Marius, in spite of protests from many people across the globe.

After he was killed away from the public eye using a bolt pistol, a zoo vet, in front of zoo guests including young children, dissected Marius. The vet explained about the various special features of a giraffe’s anatomy, including the massive heart a giraffe needs to pump blood two metres up its neck to the head. Then Marius was, again in front of zoo guests, fed to the lions.

This cause a lot of outrage, including from parts of the British media and population in general – an outrage that Danes have a very hard time understanding.

As a nation the Danes felt like they had tried to put down an animal as humanely as possible, while the rest of the world was screaming that what they were doing was tantamount to mowing it down with a machine gun for fun.

Copenhagen Zoo Director Bengt Holst and other members of the zoo received death threats, and Bengt Holst recently published some of the messages he had received from Facebook.

Camille Gorski wrote:

“Your DNA is inferior...shoot yourself in the head in the lions den for their breakfast tomorrow. Repent you sorry bastard. Nazi.”

Loredana Pucci was shorter but just as blunt:

“Shame on you, you're not human, you're the devil!!!!!”

Now, the Internet is not Britain, not by a long way. It’s just not polite enough. However, there have been many voices raised against the Danish decision.

“I find it hard to excuse the justification for the weekend’s actions,” Ben Fogle wrote in the Guardian.

Channel 4’s Matt Frei interviewed Bengt Holst about Marius and the decision to put him down.

Matt Frei questioned the fact that Marius had been killed, and particularly the fact that he had subsequently been dissected in front of children.

At one point Matt Frei asks: ‘Do you like animals?’

The answer was, if you’re in doubt, yes.

The interview is causing quite a storm online with some people supporting Bengt Holst, while others laud Matt Frei. Personally, I think it is a stylistic studio in how to keep your cool and use logical arguments – as well as a study in how not to ask questions if you want to be considered an objective journalist.

And it completely missed one of the central questions in this entire debate, which is: if Marius’ genes were already well-represented in the gene pool, then surely Copenhagen Zoo knew this 18+ months ago?

However you view the whole case – if it’s a justified action or not - I think that the whole story represents an interesting difference between England and Denmark. The way that Danes are less afraid than the English to show all sides of life – including death - to everyone, even children.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recently visited Denmark to look at the country’s food and mentality – and to find out why they are so good at noir crime stories.

He met with Søren Malling from The Killing, and asked him about why Danes, who are officially the happiest people in the world according to the UN, are so good at portraying darkness, as seen in for example The Killing.

“I know one thing for certain: we are not afraid of the dark. Many people are afraid of talking about the dark side, but I think that many people in Denmark actually recon that it is part of our lives, so why not talk about it. That it is a huge part of being a human being,” Søren Malling responded.

This is something that extends to the way that Danes raise their children. My experience is that Danes introduce subjects like death at a younger age, and that an experience like the one the children got at the zoo by seeing Marius being dissected and fed to the lions is something that’s valued.

The argument is that children should learn early on not to shy away from the dark sides of life, but to confront them. Children have a more acute understanding of the world around them than many people probably give them credit for, and will find out anyway. It might be a country versus city thing, in which case many people in the West Country might be more understanding of the Danes’ actions and their reaction to the outrage over Marius.

While it might be stretching the argument a little, I think this difference in dealing with the dark sides of life, including death, might possibly help describe what I tend to think of as the double life of British children, where they are very different when with friends compared to when they are with their parents.

Their parents have tried to shield them from reality, in order to protect them, but as a reaction British children create dual realities where they behave like good children at home and swear like sailors when they go out the front door.

3 comments

Scandalous because it violates years of convention : Zoo-keepers might sometimes be qualified zoologists, but 1. Zoologists do not do dissections simply because they have animals they can't accommodate. 2. They do not do dissections for public amusement. 3. There were several children watching the macabre scene: at universities where dissection is a first-year obligation, the labs are for adults who have had time to choose courses carefully and weigh the morality of dissection beforehand, if they want to. 5. They dissect only common breeds that are easy to rear.

No one complained when the series 'kill it - cook it - eat it' was shown on UK TV. Oh but of course, they were pigs, sheep and cows. Not cuddly wuddly so thats OK.
British island mentality strikes again....